


The Name of the Monster

by joouheika



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Manga Spoilers, Speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-10
Updated: 2014-11-10
Packaged: 2018-02-24 22:08:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2598173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joouheika/pseuds/joouheika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frieda had told them long ago.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Name of the Monster

The tip of the needle is cold on her skin.

Her father’s eyes are steeped in resolve, a resolve that has been seen in her own eyes before, unknown to her but seen before by another. Now at a time such as this Historia is still thinking of her- and surely somewhere Ymir is thinking of her likewise as she always has- as she always does.

That is what Historia is thinking, a feeling lodged in her breast, akin to longing, a nuance of desire. She closes her eyes to such a familiar gaze and when she opens her eyes once more-

\--

Sunlight floods her vision.

She is comfortably lying in their bed. Ymir is snoring softly aside her. Sometimes Sasha would sleep in the same bed as they, it’s much warmer this way and their training is hard. It’s a comfort that she’s never had as a child, sharing the warmth of another- her mother hated her. Her relatives she knew abhorred her. She didn’t have any siblings growing up. This ambiguous feeling, almost foreign is shy of it completely. She’d slept aside animals before, the horses she attended, the dogs that ran after sheep, sometimes the sheep, she’d cared for wounded birds and coaxed the friendship of a hare and a fox alike. But she is human, isn’t she?

She’d not known human warmth before Ymir, she thought.

It’s just the two of them in this bed now. Ymir’s back is facing her.

Historia touches at Ymir’s dark hair, stroking it. She’s always loved it. The grass is greener on the other side? It’s not that feeling.

Ymir stirs and rolls around in her sleep towards her, facing her. Historia pulls her hand away.

Instead admiring Ymir’s freckles as sunlight filters through the thin curtains and a crack between them. The sunlight makes it seem the air is warm outside surely as it is here in their room.

She does not question why they are the only ones here.

Ymir blinks awake, squinting against the light, swearing a little before her vision focuses and she sees Historia- she swears a little then too less under her breath than previous and for a different reason- they are both bathed in semi sunlight.

Historia wishes her good morning and Ymir near turns scarlet before coughing into her hand. She brings an arm around Historia’s shoulders, bringing her up against her chest wishing her the same, though like whatever.

Historia smiles.

“You’re silly,” she tells her, and having been brought closer she touches at the lock of hair that’s fallen over Ymir’s shoulder, twisting her fingers around it, curling and uncurling.

Ymir looks even more embarrassed about that than Historia’s greeting.

“Hey could you stop that?”

She asks and Historia replies- “No, why should I?”

Ymir gives a grunt but the reply she was given was spoken in such a soft and sweet tone that it’s hard for her to hide her growing grin on how pleased she is over the attention.

Instead she pats Historia’s head.

“Why you like doing that anyway? You do it almost every time I fall asleep ya’know? Couldn’t you like, do it when I’m awake too?”

“You’re awake now aren’t you?”

“Damn.”

Historia giggles, drawing her fingers through the lock, watching it fall back against Ymir’s chest then she brings her hand up to stroke the side of Ymir’s head, smoothing the hair down there, no longer bound by a hair clip-

“I touch your hair because I like it very much Ymir. I don’t know why but it’s familiar, it makes me… nostalgic.”

“Nostalgic? What’s so nostalgic bout black hair lots of people got it. Now your hair, I much prefer your silky golden hair Krista.”

Historia pouts, “Historia! Ymir, I’ve told you my name is Historia! Goodness,” she’s feigning displeasure, to be honest Ymir could call her anything and she would respond.

In this desolate world where she’d been empty and blank, a monochrome world that’s only colour was a splash of sinful and tragic crimson- it had been Ymir with her dark hair and wicked grin, her coveting and accusatory glare that had filled her.

Ymir can do whatever she likes.

Ymir often times did, or so she said, and it’s because Historia knows that that somehow it moves her when Ymir is compelled to do else wise- Ymir compared to her seems so free, unbounded by anyone’s hatred, anyone’s sins, anyone’s history. She simply exists to survive, enjoy herself, live.

And how she has chosen to live-

Historia was a corpse before Ymir had breathed life into her, willing her to fight, willing her to-

“Are you sure your name is Historia? Didn’t you tell me you were going to live for yourself like I was going to live for myself? And here you are, allowing the father who abandoned you to dictate what you want, trusting him all because he said a few apologies and cried. Did the kindness act infuse with your common sense?”

In that moment the sunlight is a bright blaze and Historia is blinded, unable to see Ymir anymore though she still hears her-

“I think you are actually kind, but don’t let that kindness be taken advantage of you dummy. How long have you lived, unloved?”

But you love me don’t you!

Is what Historia wants to cry out, but instead- anger sparks within her, familiar and ugly, as familiar as her shadow but darker- what Ymir has glimpsed through the haze of atonement- a darkness brighter than any flame in the dead of the coldest of nights.

“Who are you to patronize me! You’re not even here anymore! You left! You left me Ymir! Why! Not being where you are, I’m dead all over again! How can I live a life I chose if you are not here with me? Did you not spur me onto the path I’m walking? I don’t want to walk it alone, I don’t want to be alone anymore, Ymir… please Ymir…”

Tears are at the back of her eyes but do not spill, tears come easy but have never been easy to fall for her, she’s always had to coax them, blink them from her vision and then with her own fingers brush them away, as if to prove they are there. To call attention to them, look, she has tears too.

Fingers are wiping at her tears to help them fall, they are familiar and warm like Ymir’s fingers but they are not Ymir’s fingers, they are too gentle and smooth while Ymir’s touch has always been shaking and rough, trying to be gentle, the effort the true kindness, the best touch- lips that are also too gentle kiss hers and the person who climbs atop of her and embraces her, pulling back so dark hair, longer than Ymir’s hair- spills over her shoulders and the tips of touch at Historia’s cheeks-

“You are not alone, I am here with you Historia! Or I will be soon.”

It is moonlight that floods the room now, they are in the stables, lying atop of hay and each other where Historia often accidentally fell asleep, no matter the weather no one bothered to come look for her and she never minded it (she didn’t she didn’t she didn’t-)

Frieda is looking down upon her kindly, assuring.

Frieda who taught her how to read, how to laugh, how to hold her face to the sun. Historia wonders why she couldn’t have gotten freckles on her cheeks like Ymir has the number of times she’s done that- Ymir must love the sun. Historia loved to look at her freckles too, liked to count them when Ymir’s snoring was louder and woke her.

“What do you mean by that big sis? Why can’t we be together all the time? I hate it when you leave, I’m only happy when you’re here. Nobody is kind like you are.”

Frieda presses their brows together and Historia feels like she is young, young a small girl who knows nothing all over again. Only the letters Frieda taught her, only the stories Frieda had taught her, only the visage of Frieda she must replicate because otherwise she isn’t anything.

“That’s not true, I told you before didn’t I? You must be like that girl in the book. It is your destiny and your fate. You are kind Historia, you just haven’t had anyone be kind to you and so you don’t know what it’s truly like.”

“That’s not true! You’re kind to me Frieda! I tried to be kind to mother but she always pushes me away. And grandma… and grandpa…”

Frieda bumps their noses, nuzzling against her face.

“They are people who have always been treated with unkindness, don’t turn out to be like that Historia. One day you will meet a strong, just knight and you will be loved. They will love you as I love you.”

“Knight?”

“Yes, like the girl in the storybook.”

“I thought it was a monster the girl met, big sis.”

Frieda shakes her head.

“What you see with your eyes is not always what actually is, Historia. You need to care for everyone. You must be right. If you want to be loved you have to give love.”

Historia thinks it over, mulling it with less seriousness than she had as a girl but still considering it with concentrated attention.

“Like how you are always caring for me big sis Frieda. I have to-”

Who had she chose to love? It had been no knight- she is no princess whatever they say-

The needle pricks her and she looks down to her father who is imploring her.

“-please, Historia forgive me. Avenge your family, your big sister Frieda- who was so kind to you-to everyone, if you take this serum you will gain the possibilities of inheriting your right, the titan’s power.”

Historia looks forward, nothing is shown in her eyes, the sunlight is gone, the moonlight is gone, here under the ground of their church surrounded by unbreakable crystal, the sky cannot be seen at all. A cage.

“Father, you want me to walk in Frieda’s place?”

Her father looks sad and withdrawn, the intensity of before, his desire for revenge, hinges for a moment to show her what she wants to see. Regret, pity, remorse-

Before surging back up as ugly as the darkness within her.

He is using her.

“I do.”

Though he loves her.

She thinks of Ymir.

If Historia accepts this serum to be injected inside her, she will turn into a titan momentarily. Driven by unfathomable hunger to eat another human to return to how she was, her father wants her to eat Eren- and obtain the power he has- the power his father stole from her sister to give to him- yes, that could happen but also-

Eren is struggling against his bonds, they should hurry.

Her father is completely still as she replies.

“I can’t do that. I am not Frieda and Frieda is not me.” 

The world has long crumbled in his eyes yet he still strove to keep the pieces together. This world he has protected as been entrusted to their bloodline by the gods.

“I don’t mind if Frieda lives on in me. I will take back her memory! Go on ahead! I accept your will!”

Her father sighs in relief and the needle goes under her skin, into her flesh, into a vein and as she’s injected she mulls over the destiny Frieda had once said was hers.

Frieda was wrong.

Ymir was wrong.

Her father is wrong.

Historia is, she is-

“But, don’t get the wrong idea father. I am not kind, not like Frieda.”

Light and steam, smoke, and blood.

Historia eats-

\--

Eren’s gaze is not like Historia’s nor her father’s, his gaze is his mother’s.

Historia has picked him up, ripping out the chains that held him down by doing so, the gag starts to slip, also torn. Eren tries to spit it out, does, the stale air beneath ground tastes horrible, as is the pounding of his heart as Historia draws him closer to her bloodied mouth.

Eren had been struggling to free himself, not only for the reason of his own life, but that other possibility.

Having turned into a titan before her father like Eren had to his, she may eat her own father as he had. That was what Eren had thought, and reality it came to pass.

The memories of his father massacring the Reiss family, him eating his father, the power of the titans- in him has surfaced other memories. He has to tell Historia, he has to- the gag no longer at his mouth he’s sucked in breath to call out loud and clear before Historia suddenly, in her clumsy new titan form, decides to crush him in her faulty grip-

“STOP!”

Historia stops.

Bound by the power in Eren’s voice she is forced to; the call he has to their kind and others infected is too strong, it is a call not fallen upon him by any divine right or stolen ability, it is an ability that has slept inside him all this time, passed down to him.

“Put me down.”

Historia puts Eren down. The curving incline crushed and the walls smashed against though not destroyed, they cannot be.

Eren stands, shakily at first, he steps on splattered blood, he has to hurry no doubt people were going to come, be they friend or foe he has to tell her before anything.

He brings up his hand, looking upon it- he could bite into it now and transform as well. In this closed space, with his experience, and his own capable hand to hand combat skills he would win against Historia should they fight as titans.

But that would not be right, what Historia seeks is a justice too bleak, too tragic, too akin to his own. The sins of his father, passed onto him can never be done right, or washed away even under never ending rain. That may be so, but at the very least he can do this. It is not a fist like to that of the titan that’d eaten his mother and killed Mr Hannes, it is an open hand like that which Historia and her father had placed upon his back and revived in him, his father’s memories, his own memories and also-

Frieda’s memories.

The time Historia had spent with her Eren had seen it all, and so he wants to show her- the time he had spent with Frieda.

Summer, autumn, winter, spring.

The most vivid memory Frieda can show the both of them as Eren places his palm against Historia’s is of the day she had met with Eren.

In a field of forget-me-nots.

\--

They say none of them can forget but they had forgotten.

Who her mother really is.

That doctor had stolen her away and messed them up, when he appears before her again many years later to tell her Carla is dead she is ready, has been ready for so long to kill him.

One day she had told Historia she will meet a knight, strong and just.

To support her, to defend her, to love her.

If that is true or not.

Many seasons since meeting him by chance on her way back from seeing Historia- in that flower field where they now meet every now and then, having been drawn by his scent over that of the flowers and the sight of the red scarf her mother used to adorn, the fringes of which caught on the autumn wind and her vision- all bringing her to learn they are the same flesh- confirmed once she saw his face- she tells him- “One day when you are strong you will protect a princess kind and fair. Perhaps marry her.”

He had shook his head.

“I don’t want to Frieda,” he had told her, “Not unless she’s also strong, strong like you.”

Frieda thought it over.

Then would Eren rather marry her?

Eren said he wouldn’t mind, in the way that young boys do to pretty older girls half a decade their senior, ones they admire and are so impressed by she knows. Such a protective little brother. She had ruffled his hair as they sat amongst the flowers. Eren had been picking some for his mother the first time they’d met, or had tried to despite the season- his father had been gone a long while and he’d wanted to cheer his mother up though she wouldn’t be happy over his dirty knees.

Frieda had asked if he liked flowers.

He did too, like (their) mother, so she’d taught him how to make flower crowns when the season was right which he shows to his friends.  
What friends?

His friend who loves books much like the one Frieda reads him, another friend whom he’d given his scarf to.

You must protect your friends.

One day he wants to grow as strong as Frieda wishes him to be to protect his friends.

He mentions this each and every time he sees her since the time she told him of her power, an showed him, transforming on a limb, and reveling only half a carcass, a cage of muscle and bone much like one he will summon later to defend those he wishes to protect from the fire of guns and cannons.

“If I bite into my hand and truly will it I will turn into a titan. But not just any titan, a titan stronger than the rest. No one can defeat me and I will not be defeated. Maybe one day I will show you how to gain this power too and you can join me Eren!”

Eren spent a good deal of time biting his hand in practice then after. Though Frieda told him not to do that. He’d woken so many times from what felt like a long sleep wondering at the bite marks on his hand.

Like Historia she had sealed away his memories as well.

Frieda who remembered everything and had taught them everything.

This world is over.

They both remember the beginning of the book she loved to read them.

They both remember sitting aside her (never at the same time, never did they meet, what fate would they have had if they had met sooner?) Eren at her right and Historia at her left- her long dark hair reminds Eren of his mother’s and Historia admires their aligned locks of hair as she rests a head against Frieda’s shoulder, the contrast like night and day. Frieda opens up that worn book and reads to them the first line.

A smile on her lips and she doesn’t even need to read it from the page having said it so many times, she has it memorized like many things, to heart. She looks now, to the blue sky as they sit together in these vast fields that hides them from this cruel world, her beautiful voice their only comfort as the story begins as it always does no matter the passage-

“To you, in 2,000 years.”


End file.
